


In Which Hashirama Builds a House and Madara Burns It Down

by Fallowfield



Category: Naruto, Naruto Shippuden
Genre: Foundations: A Naruto Founders Zine, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-03
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-16 14:48:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18693676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fallowfield/pseuds/Fallowfield
Summary: After a long winter, spring arrives, and Konoha was born.





	In Which Hashirama Builds a House and Madara Burns It Down

**Author's Note:**

> This is for Foundations: A Naruto Founders Zine hosted by Incubus Wings Zines

I.

For a while, then, I could only sprout cedar trees. It was wintertime. Their grains were bold and dark and red, and they flowed more slowly, an aftertaste of bittersweet chocolate, of molasses. I love them, you know, I always do. They make the sturdiest house, with those grand, hefty beams. You hear the wind howling past, though it is never able to shake them.  There is nothing more stable than a cedar tree. They are constancy personified. The winter weighs heavily on them and yet they stand. They always reminded me of someone. I knew when I met him I would never be the same.

They never tell you to prepare for spring. For summer. No. They tell you to stock up for winter. I can hear my brother’s voice now. It’s what your thoughts are all year. Look upwards at the sky; winter is coming. You think: it’s summer and the sun is baking my skin. It’s glorious, but what about winter? It will come before I know it. The days get shorter with every sunset. 

People always say winter is so tragic, a long-winded dirge flowing down from the mountains. When the sun is there it is so impossibly far, past a vaulted dome as if you’re under water, and so pale. They assume I hate it, a man whose veins merge with those of the branches. Sometimes I swear they think my skin will peel and reveal birch bark. So much death, they say. How can a tree be happy?

But maybe death isn’t all that bad. You know, trees are the longest guests at the cemetery. I, too, can feel the spirits more closely in the winter. They walk aimlessly around, kneeling, then press seeds into the snow. They aren’t singing, but they are patient. Much more patient than any of us. The earth is cold but calming, and they wait. They know the sun will return to them and warm the earth, then they will sprout green. The trees know the day will come, and in the meantime they open one eye to watch you pad by them through the snow, but then return to sleep.

I always thought of winter as a rest, the earth returning home from a long day. The trees disrobe, untying their obis and lining their shoes by the door. It is just the trees and who they love, a bird’s nest, a burrow, tangled in a white sheet. The pale light in the morning but you’re still in bed. Winter houses those gentle moments that nobody can see.

For what is spring without winter? If the earth was always aflower, would we grow blind to it? Would it become meaningless? The birds would always sing. There would be no burst into chorus when the sun shows its face again. There would be no lightheaded feeling as you hold your breath just beyond your comfort. We would not see the need for the trees to gather together, their backs to the wind. They sway together in the gales, roots intertwined. 

But there is a certain relief, a grand, slow exhale, when the sun moves closer again. When you can feel it smiling. I wait for the days I can walk barefoot again. The earth feels alive beneath my feet. It’s like roots could sprout from my soles and tangle with the others that tie knots beneath me. We could all become one being.

_ Skip skip skip. _ The surface of the creek shows its face again. It’s funny that the water always knows spring first. The earth is still slumbering, wrapped in its white blanket, but the water begins to flow again. There are ripples where the stone falls. How am I so sure it’s been so many years? It feels the same here. I can almost see him emerging from the trees. He always lurked in the same hollow. Oddly enough, it was a cedar. I see it standing here still today, untouched by time. These decades are nothing to it. I wonder if it even noticed how we grew up. I want to ask it if it even remembers anything we cry about.

People always think of the colors. The flowers always kissing their palettes. Those masters. But what I remember is the sound. I could always hear such a wide and sweeping song. The flowers bright and the sycamores watching. They’re never shy, singing joyous notes back to the sunshine’s gentle caress. They do not fear such a huge presence. It has the time to greet each tiny being by name. Humans are always in such a hurry. They forget things.

I can grow so many types of trees then. They no longer slumber. They are lithe and breathing and waving in the wind. Thick, ancient trunks and saplings together, alive again, presenting their buds to the sky as if serving it.

Spring is a good time to build a village. My brother always said “Wait. Wait. Nothing built too swiftly is ever strong.” And he’s right in a sense. The enormous cypress breathe so calmly, slowly widening their belts one ring per year. I laugh at how the younger brother ended up wiser than the older. The water always guides the wood, I guess. But there are always those that stray, even to parched earth. I also think of more humble strengths, less visible than those huge successes, like that of a seed who bursts into growth when it drinks the telling sip. In a matter of days it is already sustaining itself. And one day it will become that tree. Anyways, we will build it on the shoulders of giants. Our village will not come to be if we stand aside and wait for a sign. We’ve had generations of war. We’re tired. Our unborn children are tired. We lay in the grass now, in desperate need of rest, hoping the shadow of the tree is enough to conceal us. And with spring, we have three whole seasons before the hardships of winter return.

But a village starts with an unnatural structure. Otherwise it’s still the forest. It’s home to all the woodland creatures, but not humans somehow. Humans are especially delicate. They wither when they’re alone, but need constant protection from others. People are our greatest support and our greatest threat. How can we handle this paradox?

Before you can see the beams rising above you, though, you have to clear a place. It seems counterintuitive. You kill the trees just to stack their corpses. But even before then, you must dig down into the earth. You must find the bedrock. We can’t let our home be anything but strong. It must be enduring. So you must be enduring. You have to let the rain beat against your back for a moment longer. There is no shelter for the one building a shelter. I’d want it to be me. I don’t want our children to have to forage for a place to hide from the downpours. I don’t want them to have to chase off beasts, especially those who are human.

I remember when I looked at him. And those weren’t his eyes. Still red, but clearly not his. The face I’d known all my life was alien to me. The first feeling, an arrow striking, a breathless punch, was sadness. I remembered our years. I remembered the gift of our clandestine retreats. How we could cultivate such a bond.

If we had a seashore maybe I could have formed a ship out of strong oak wood, masts scraping the sky. What if we had just sailed away? What if we just left them all here? But both of us were too loyal for that. It would be a false summer. We’ve cried tears for our brothers and our children. Neither of us could forget.

I’ve seen those tears water wilted leaves, though, falling on their parched tongues. There can always be a rebirth. I cannot see how it is impossible, to love both at once. The earth loves the sun, we know it does, but every year it turns its face away and grows cold. We know, though, that it does not last. It always returns to the sun’s embrace again.

Once you lay the foundation, then you can build. Then you can form the towers and make man’s unique marks on the earth. It’s strange to be a man who builds forests, because men never do. The shapes of our villages rise geometric, disavowing their organic roots. But remember. We always seem to decorate with flowers. How far away can we truly stray? In the spring we grow and we build, then look ahead to our legacy, their inheritance, our coming feats of the summer. 

I can’t wait to have a drink with him.

 

II.

A lonely chime plays in the wilderness. I can walk forever and never find it. What if he were still here, even eyeless? Without him, the trees close in on me, a labyrinth, even with eyesight anew. He was a better compass than these red eyes could ever be. Now when I see tears, I just see streams of blood. And his smile. He smiled then. Giving those to me. And he never smiled for no reason.

Izuna. He always told me that they were trickster gods, with sweet words on their lips but lies in their hearts. It hurts when two people you love give conflicting advice. Hashirama would have had to change entirely to even utter a lie. To what extent can years change a person?

There are some things that stay the same, though, like the stars so many infinities away. We watched them together, backs in the new green grasp of the seedling grass. I remember my eyes following his finger as it traced between them. If only it were so inconsequential.

Hashirama always threw his head back and laughed and laughed. I always noticed it. It spread to the face of every flower, an unceasing current, pressing its fingers into my cheeks until my mouth softened. I couldn’t ever seem to fight it. I wonder if he noticed how I turned my face away each time. How could he be a creature of darkness?

I heard their voices, you know. I was not deaf to them.

But this time it was he who turned his face. “I will not kill you.”  I saw the dew collect in the thumbprints of the leaves. Could they be sipped like goblets? What if in some fantasy we all could sit at a grand table, feasting as one? Like he always dreamed. “I want to see where your roots grow. What springs you let flow, what foundations you destroy.” I saw in his eyes a strange wish. He wished he was weaker. He wished my strikes had vanquished him long ago. But he was too strong. Losing to someone weaker was too much a lie. And I’d never heard him lie before. Why would be begin now?

I imagined him then, buried under one of those headstones, eyes shut and peaceful. He will probably die with his fingers already laced together on his chest. 

Hashirama would be graceful, even in death. I never figured he would fear it. What I’ve discovered is that in those who are soft, the fear is often muted and eddying, almost tameable like a wolf. Hashirama would clasp his hands and laugh at it. He’d already embraced it. Maybe he had something in common with Izuna. When I realized that, gazing at his face under that hokage cap, something in my chest fell to my feet. 

He’d already given his life. It was already gone. So death was nothing. There was no sadness in his eyes or the creases of his lips but I could feel it already flowing through his blood. His eyes had been wise since childhood. Patient and waiting.  Does a man always have to give himself to a cause? Can he ever just be a man, as he is? Can he ever just stand independent, a tree in a clearing with a broad trunk and rippling leaves? But even when Hashirama stood firmly on his own, his branches were thick and luxurious, the home of many nesting birds eating from his abundance of fruits. He would never just save his resources for himself. Giving always was a need to him.

He’d have given his eyes, too. His beautiful, ordinary eyes.

I realized that Konoha’s winter had been a buffer for me, a stalling of the inevitable. People usually hate the cold, but for me it froze time. The snow softly blanketed things as they were, keeping the seeds from sprouting for just a little longer. But they could not rest forever.

My true winter was Konoha’s springtime. The loneliness came slowly at first, seeping through the walls, but then it came in stronger, a torrential rainfall. Over time the drops froze, even in the spring sunlight kissing my brow. I had always been afraid of the encroaching darkness in the wilderness, but now the light was what I feared. It was an incredibly selfish bitterness, like wincing at the light of dawn when your bed is so warm. I just never wanted our moment to end.

A great ball of fire descends. Fire is always so starving, devouring everything in sight before it can savor the taste. But the trees don’t cry, they shimmer. They pause and taste these flames before they wilt. It’s a cleansing. I know he would say that. His words stick. I can’t shake them off. But I’ve seen the knot of sorrow in his throat. He swallows but I can feel his ache. Those who pull the burrs off, wipe the soot away. It’s a different type of pain.

If he were still here, it would not only be built again in a single night, but it would be twice as lovingly carved. It would glow from the hilltop, a beacon for humanity. You wouldn’t need eyes to see it.

I can’t seem to escape him. The angels really do walk this earth. I see them in everything. I hate seeing my reflection. Sometimes I want to erase this place of our memories. Burn away this knoll. But I never seem to find the heart. I kneel at the riverside. The surface makes me blink. Is that Izuna’s face? I mar it by skipping a stone. I myself am a lie. Without eyes, can someone still cry?

And Hashirama. It’s unfair that every tree echoes his name. Every flower his laughter. There is so much in the world now that he didn’t want. I wonder what would finally shatter his joy. It’s a devil I don’t know. Have we reached that point? Who am I kidding? I almost want that. There is nothing more heartbreaking to me than that smile I know he would have. Look, the wildfire blotted out the whole forest. We take our time to mourn, but then he would stand and push up his sleeves. That smile. Time to start from scratch. Time to gather the scorched earth in his hands and grow buds again.

Because in Hashirama’s palm there is a neverending spring. Can it ever be stronger than our fated wars? Can you ever expect to stop the cycles of nature? The only hope lies in nature itself.

I wanted to have a drink with him.

**Author's Note:**

> Catch me on twitter @fallofield!


End file.
